


please I don't want to scream

by daikonradish



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Ghosts, Goblins, M/M, Pagan Gods, Spirits, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:42:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,506
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23248672
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daikonradish/pseuds/daikonradish
Summary: Haechan digs up the wrong grave.
Relationships: Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Mark Lee, Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Na Jaemin
Comments: 2
Kudos: 44





	please I don't want to scream

He sneezes.

There is rain pounding down his back, as he shovels into the crevices of the earth. The water is freezing but his hands are burning, the cold metal of the gray shovel rubbing raw on his blistered fingers. He should have worn gloves, probably, a jacket thicker than a pale windbreaker, most likely. He hadn’t thought it through.

The moment he had pushed the shovel into the ground, right below a litter of white wildflowers clustered around a splintered gray headstone, the sky had erupted in a violent rainstorm. He likes rain. But a storm of this magnitude is not welcomed.

If he was superstitious, he would say it was the heavens telling him that this is a bad idea.

However, he’s not.

His vision blurs to the onslaught of rain, with his black hair matted against his forehead. He feels like he is being held underwater. But he can’t stop digging yet, not until he makes it to the casket. He digs and digs, pulling out loose pebbles and ceaseless mud.

His shovel stops.

He resumes his shovelling with a renewed fervor. There are shivers running down his body, and his muscles ache uncomfortably with every jerking motion of his arms. He wants nothing more than to be at home, in the peace of the small apartment. He just needs to pull out the casket, load it up in the faded blue minivan, and get a thousand miles away from this abandoned boneyard.

He can make out the exterior of the casket under scatters of dirt. The dark brown wood of the casket is cracked, in poor condition from the eruption of rain. It’s not what he expected from a grave that rests apart from the others within the boneyard. There’s nothing to gain from being curious, so he bites his thoughts away and gets on his knees.

Forgoing his shovel, he reaches downwards for the edges of the wooden casket. The earth and skies run over his hands as he claws into the mud to get a firm handle on the tomb. He lets out a deep exhale, before lifting.

The hardest part is getting it out of the ground. But this casket is unexpectedly light. He bites down on his lips, hard enough to draw blood, as he heaves the casket to the surface.

The moment the casket is out, he’s falling down onto the wet grass. He brushes the water in his eyes against his forearms, dragging the mud that crawled up his arms over his face. He laments his unfortunate fate, covered in the descants on the earth in the middle of nowhere. The rain washes over his body like an unholy baptism.

Until it’s not.

He cracks open his eyes to a blurringly blue sky. There is not a cloud in sight. These sudden changes of the weather are nothing abnormal, but there’s a bundle of nerves in his stomach that won’t settle down.

He sits up in a start, turning around to find the top of the casket open.

“Fuck,” He mutters, running his tongue over his bruised lips. His heart is beating to an unnatural rhythm, legs thrumming with the urge to run away. But his bones are aching, and he can only clamber closer to the casket. Never before has he hoped to come face to face with a skeleton. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.” He peers down into the opened casket, heart dropping.

It’s empty. Completely bare. Without anything left behind. His eyes do catch on a scrawling of letters scratched into the corner. A word, in a language he cannot decipher, that he has seen before. As his tongue catches against his teeth trying to pronounce the word, he hears a rush of sound. But it’s not anything he’s heard before, too smooth, too rounded to match his clipped language.

It’s here. On these hallowed grounds, is the corpse that has risen from it’s grave. He doesn’t dare look up from his muddied hands, dirt caked into his short fingernails. He wonders if it’s terror that makes his limbs feel cold under the shower of sunlight overarching his trembling frame. Or, he wonders if he has resigned himself to this fate.

There’s a hand that gently pulls his jaw upwards.

The corpse stares at him.

No, not a corpse. This man doesn’t look anything over two decades. Or, more importantly, he doesn’t look like anything in the least resembling the steps of decomposition. Not when the sun is hitting dark brown hair and running down faultless skin. The man is made up of austerely sharp lines that stroke past a strong jaw and pressed lips. No, definitely not a corpse.

And that realization has his stomach turning.

He can’t move away from the man’s grasp, no matter how he tries to turn his head away. He wants nothing more than to be anywhere away from this man, or creature, or corpse. In his frustration, there are hot tears that spring from his eyes, spilling down his cheeks and leaving scorching trails.

The corpse smiles. Or something like a smile. His lips spread apart in the perfect distance with perfect teeth the shade of white and perfect dimples carved onto the sides of his face, but there is something so inhumane in that smile. 

“Noli timere,” The corpse whispers. There is an underlying enunciation to his winding words, that makes him think that this corpse has been under the ground for a very long time.

He can’t breathe. He wouldn’t dare make a sound in the presence of a corpse. The stillness of his limbs contrasted to the thundering of his heart has his mind spinning to the tune of a hundred memories. He bites at his lips, once more, pushing down the thoughts that threaten to shatter. The corpse has brown eyes, and he memorizes the colour like a prayer. 

“Why are you afraid?” The corpse asks, the smile on his sculpted features retreating.

He opens his mouth, but no words escape his throat. There is a lurching of his hearts and nerves, kindled by the pure terror that falls from his eyes in the shape of water. His breathing is stilted as he tries desperately to form a sentence, trembling to the mere consideration that he might anger the corpse.

“W-what the fuck are you?” He manages to whimper, tasting the salt of tears that drop into his mouth.

The sculpt of features twist into an unreadable expression, but that’s all he can make out before the corpse is gone.

Haechan releases the thousands of breathes that he was holding, crying into his shaking hands.

There is a muted song playing on the radio, barely heard over the whistle of wind and the run of tires. There is only a few faded cars on the winding roads that climb over the rolling hills to reach the town. The only visitors they ever seem to get are wayward hitchhikers stopping by for gas. But no one stays for long.

Chaewon spares a glance towards him, eyes catching on the silver cross that hangs on the front mirror.

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost.” She remarks, pushing on the accel.

“That’s not funny,” He inhales a stuttering breath, pulling his stained knees to his chest.

The sounds on the radio flicker. He hates this song. He’s never heard it before, but he knows that the thrum of a deep voice and echoing organ will be ingrained in his conscience and remind him of the graveyard.

“You shouldn’t listen to him.” Chaewon states, the gentle inflection of her voice woven into an order. “I know he’s been by your side, but he’s really not any good.”

The car hurries past the dilapidated sign painted a withering green that tells them they are entering the town of Nohwa. But he doesn’t need a sign to tell him where he is. Not when the birds disappear, the fog gets thicker and the nights get longer. Because as much as this is a town, it’s also a feeling, an atmosphere, that weighs down on any weary soul unfortunate enough to come across it. 

He shakes his head, unable to form the words weighing on his heart.

He can feel the cracks on the broken roads, passing the center of town that is filled with a sea of low buildings in a discolouration of browns and blacks. The buildings are empty, or at least, they should be. The coven has no interest in the mundane, but the same can not be said for creatures of the night. He shuts his eyes, because he knows if he opens them, he will only see a stream of spirits flooding the streets, overflowing in crowds of pale skin.

The engine resembles the howling winds when the car stops.

“Thanks for the ride.” He tries on a smile, something hard to remember.

Chaewon has always been the smart one, and she furrows her brows in concern. She’s also always been the pretty one, but there is no escape from the stench of death, of hopelessness, that resonates in town. She runs a hand through her frazzled black hair, the crescents of a gray moon under her eyes all the more apparent against pale skin.

“Hey, I’m,” Chaewon tries to say, but her eyes are entangled by the silver cross. “I’ll pray for you.”

He can only nod, soundlessly sliding out of the car. He knows, better than anyone else, that prayers are the charms, the curses, of mortals, and that the thousands of charms, of curses, that have been cast upon him have not amounted to anything. He remembers a time when they would catch frogs in the forest, writing runes and casting hexes, but he supposes many things have changed for both of them.

He can make out the scratch of tires behind him as he stares at the apartment in front of him. It isn’t much of a home, not even quite like an apartment. There’s a store crammed with stationary on the first floor and a cluster of rooms rented out on the second floor, reached only by way of the terrible tremble of a stairwell attached to the side.

He heaves up the stairs. The more time he spends outside, the more he feels like he’s going insane.

The door is jammed when he tries the open it, the cold metal of the handle turning down in a mocking manner. He gives the door a generous kick, and it creaks open to reveal a scatter of newspapers spread out on the carpeted floor. There are headlines and images that he can only guess are about whatever is going wrong in the country.

“What happened to you?” Jaemin sneers, a wicked thing.

The spirit takes up space on the bed, fingers tapping on the hems of a crumpled newspaper.

He shuffles into the room after tossing his worn sneakers to the side, taking in his disheveled appearance in the mirror. There are smears of dirt on all the parts of his body that were not covered, a wonderful coating of grime on his hair. “It rained.”

He makes a face, absently pulling at the small hoops in his ear. “Where’s the body?”

“Yeah, uh that didn’t really work out.” That might be an understatement. “The thing came alive.”

Jaemin laughs, a sound that scratches the wallpapers.

“You said that I could use the _dead_ body to fix my fucking curse.” He glowers, balancing his weight on the soles of his feet, his socks painted in colours of mud. “That thing wasn’t dead.”

He swallows to the burning memories of the pale corpse. He doesn’t know where it might have disappeared to. He doesn’t know where it might appear next. The whine of the heater running over his head almost buries his murmur. “You could have come with me.”

“So, you could kill me all over again?” Jaemin smiles in a way that doesn’t reach his eyes.

Haechan holds his breath, looking down at the floor so that he won’t be able to see him if he starts crying.

“Don’t worry. It’s not our problem now.”

“Right.” Haechan says, but it’s not convincing.

Something is wrong.

He’s never been one attuned to the whims of nature. No. That was something that his brother excelled in. Excels in. He hasn’t been in contact with his brother since he was disowned, but he can still recollect the way that mantras slipped from his brother’s mouth like the languid currents of a river.

But, he’s not stupid. He was raised in a coven after all.

He stares out of his windows at the continuous thunder of rainfall crashing on the window, shaking the foundations of the rickety apartment. The rain is red. A pale and watery red that drips down his windows, staining the town in a rose-coloured view. There are strikes of scarlet flashing in the sky, almost resembling the figures carved in wood and stone that might litter a witch’s home.

He swears that if he looks at the horizon long enough, he can see something moving, something churning in the autumn fog. There might be dead housecats and snowfall in the summer but there are rules in Nohwa. There is a natural balance of the spiritual entities, of the magic, within the town. To tip that balance, is bad news.

There’s a knock at the door.

He shakes his head away from the pounding windows and stumbles over the disorientating pile of knitted blankets and crumped newspapers strewn on the floor to reach the entrance. He had pushed everything off his bed during a restless sleep. He never quite remembers his dreams, but he could guess his night was filled with the kind of towering demons that might hide under his bed. 

He clicks open the door and the landlady stands in front of him, looking anywhere but at him.

“Good morning.” He says, and her stare settles on the space between his eyes. The unnerving whites of her eyes submerge any mention of black. It must be his terrible disposition that makes him think that she might have it better off than him.

“Hello there, Haechan. I hear that it’s raining.”

“Yeah, there’s a big rainstorm outside.”

“Oh, well, I’ve just ran out of milk and eggs.” She smiles, with her few teeth. “Do you think you could be a dear and run over to the mart to get some?”

“Of course.”

“Thank you, Haechan. I’ll be waiting downstairs.”

He turns around, letting the door close between them, to grab a jacket that might hold up in the weather. The old woman had been one of the only people to help him out when he was kicked out of the coven. The least he could do was get her some milk and eggs.

There isn’t much of a selection in the empty closet, so he disgruntledly grabs his windbreaker, crumpled up from the events of another day. In the past, the windbreaker was a blinding orange, but now, it has discoloured into the blended shades of flesh. He grimaces, shoving on his shoes and sliding out of the door.

The red rain is hot against his frame, and he feels sick with the feeling that something is wrong.

But first, milk and eggs.

Immediately, he’s running for the convenience store around the corner.

There’s no one in the store, of course. There is the green hue of fluorescent lighting that blinks over his frame, flickering to the murmurs of spirits. The voices are quiet, which is his only stroke of luck. He treads through the aisles, pulling out what the landlady needs, and even grabbing a package of scented candles. He’s tired of smelling rotting flesh.

The cashier stares at him with dead eyes. There’s nothing wrong with the smudge of her mascara or the lipstick a shade too red to match her pale skin, but he knows those letters that are carved into her nails.

He’s sure to make the interaction as short as possible, speeding out of the store after he pays while clutching the plastic bag in his chest, hidden away from the onslaught of rain. The rain that pounds down his head, filling his vision with the sight of red, red, red, and there are eyes.

There are eyes in the alleys. Nothing new. But nothing good.

He pushes forward, ignoring the red that bleeds into his shoes, the red that covers his eyes, the red that marked the end of his childhood and the beginning of another life.

The yellow eyes of a goblin crack into his view.

He starts, almost dropping the bag.

The goblin laughs, the misshapen representation of a towering demon morphing into a perfectly, normal boy dressed in a padded jacket and shorts, all except for the gleaming eyes of yellow that give him away as a creature of the night.

“You should’ve seen your face.” Another goblin cackles, clapping his hands.

He glowers, the scent of copper in the air. He hates being stuck in the rain, with a spirit, at that.

“This isn’t the time, Chenle.” He states, voice shaking.

Chenle only smiles, a collection of someone else’s teeth in his mouth. “Why? Did I scare you?”

“The rain is red. I don’t think that’s a good sign.”

The moment the words leave his mouth, the rain pounding on his head stops.

There are shivers running down his back when he looks over to find a man dressed in a black suit with a black umbrella. He knows that the man is a goblin, because there are the reverberation of voices in the silence, the swell of the chorus and the spirits that howl in reverence.

“Jisung. Chenle. Don’t you have somewhere to be.” The man states. And his words are absolute, because the young creatures are scurrying away, the colour washing out of their features.

“Are you okay?” He asks, closing the distance between them. The placating curve of his eyes is familiar, but there are stars in his eyes. Or, something like that. Something that makes him that much less human than him. The light that makes it through the amalgamation of crimson clouds gleam through the pure black of his eyes.

“I’m fine.” He answers softly. 

He knew Minhyung when he was younger, when he was only another boy in the coven, and he was only another spirit in the woods. The snapping of beads in an assortment of the deepest blue and the richest green entangled in his black hair is enough to remind him that he is no longer just another goblin in the woods.

“You don’t look fine.” Minhyung frowns, bringing a gentle hand to the side of his face. “Have you been eating well?”

The gleaming beads stare back at him and he steps back from the touch.

“Is everything okay, around,” He gestures around, from the quaking skies to the thundering grounds, “Here?”

“Everything is okay.” Minhyung answers, lowering his eyes. “But you’d best not go out after midnight.”

It’s not a statement so much as it is a command.

Because he’s not a goblin anymore. He’s the king.

When he was a child, he had dreams.

He had a dream to travel the world with the boy he loved, to settle down in the town with the people he loved, to become a great and powerful witch that could gain the respect of the coven. Those dreams were foolish, he knows now. But at least, he had them.

He sits up from his spot on the bed, nestled in a cocoon of a hundred knitted blankets that he received from the landlady. Running his fingers over tired eyes, folding them into a spell that he can’t use, he can make out the spirit huddled on his floor, crumpling newspapers and rolling them against the floor.

“What time is it?” Haechan asks, testing out the waters.

Jaemin turns around, showing his canines. “Why the hell would I know? I’m dead.”

“I’m just asking.” He frowns, voice muffled against the hems of the blankets.

He’s tempted to fall asleep once more, but the spirit is climbing onto the bed, sliding into a comfortable place beside him as he unravels a strip of old newspaper. He can’t see Jaemin’s face from this angle, but he knows that he must have armed a dangerous smile.

“I have an idea.”

He doesn’t like the sound of that.

“The dead body might not have worked, but hear me out,” Jaemin points out a grainy picture on the newspaper, of a homemade altar for the wooden figurine of an elephant. “We capture a god.”

“Jaemin.” He stutters, dread gathering at the bottom of his stomach. “There’s only one god in this town.”

“And we’ll trap them, use them in a potion that will grant our wishes.”

“Jaemin. I can’t do that, they’re the God of the coven. They are not something I can even comprehend doing anything with, much less whatever you’re suggesting. If I even go near them, I’ll be killed, and I don’t want to die.” He’s stammering and he’s not sure what he’s saying at all, but all he knows is that even the barest mention of that god makes him feel like there are a thousand eyes in the town turned to him, his birthname written on their foreheads.

“Don’t you want to get rid of your sight?” Jaemin sits in front of him, his head tilted to the side, eyes blinking in the picture of innocence. The expression is a memory that lets him breath a little slower, staring into the black, black eyes that he remembers from his childhood.

“Yes,” He admits, biting his lips.

“Don’t you want to bring me back to life?” Jaemin leans forward, knocking their foreheads together, smiling in a way that doesn’t reach his eyes, but by this time he’s become enamoured by his memories.

“Yes,” He nods.

“Then, bring me back that motherfucker’s head.”

“Yes,” He nods again, and lets the spirit take his hand and pull him to his feet.

The sky is red. And he still doesn’t know what time it is when he opens the door.

It’s not raining anymore, but there is nothing in the sky. There are no clouds, no sun, no moon. There’s nothing that he can see, other than the colour red. There’s a foreboding sense of wrongness that slides under his skin, making his bones ache as he steps onto the ledge at the front of the little brown building.

Jaemin seems to sense his uneasiness, because he turns his face towards him, knocking their foreheads together. The movement is familiar, and he looks up at the spirit in wonder.

“You’re know what you need to do.” Jaemin smiles, “For me.”

“Okay.” He repeats, like a spell, “For you.”

He closes his eyes, repeating the words under his breath, building a fortress in his heart. When he opens his eyes, they are gone, and he is in the middle of a dense and crimson fog.

“Jaemin?” He doesn’t know why he asks.

Breathing out his worries, he lets his feet take him down the familiar path. He knows this destination like the back of his hand. Even when he tried to forget through sleepless nights of praying to exotic gods, he never could seem to shake the memories of his childhood. They are vibrant and beautiful, and he hates them. The power they have over him.

He wades through the crowds of the dead, staring at the ashen features of the creatures that have escaped humanity. He passes a child in a petticoat, a man with a glass eye, a woman in a retiring blouse, to name a few of the creatures that wander the streets of the town. He knows it’s not polite to stare, but he doesn’t think they will mind.

These spirits can’t touch him. He knows that.

That doesn’t mean they don’t scare him.

He climbs through the debris of the dead, looking away from the rotting flesh that surrounds him. He passes a child with an axe lodged into their head, a towering man with blood spilling out of his hat, and a woman crawling in a form without limbs, to name a few of the corpses that plague the streets of the town. Beholding them in their decomposed states, surrounding him with the stench of the dead, make his stomach feel weak, his knees bend, and his eyes water.

He closes his eyes, but he can feel the cold chill that passes through his body whenever he steps through a spirit. And no matter where he goes, it’s always cold.

When he was younger, he wanted to know why the dead wouldn’t leave the town. Depending on who he asked, he would get a different answer. Whether it was stories about ley lines, old voodoo, a paradise for demons, a hellscape for those from the heavens, or an ancient tale about star-crossed lovers, his favorite story was about a graveyard. A circle of headstones in the town that denoted the resting place of many, many strange creatures. He was fascinated with the idea that these creatures were under his feet, breathing with the cascade of the tides, waiting to be pulled by the moon.

Lost in his memories, he misplaces his feet, his ankles bending in an awkward manner as he falls to the ground. His hands are not fast enough to support his fall and the gravel meets skin.

“Ow,” He groans, his body lurching forward as the dull sensation of pain floods down his face to his limbs.

He pushes himself back up, a flash of stars blinding his vision. He brings a hand to his face to check the damage, and when he pulls back there is the bright shade of blood wrung around his fingers. Behind the shade of red, he can make out the crimson engraving of runes on the brown building in front of him.

He’s here.

The small building made out of brown bricks does not stand out in the middle of the town. If you didn’t know any better, you would think it is just another building in the middle of the town. But the coven doesn’t need a sign, not when they house the only god in town.

He looks around, but there is not another creature in sight. He doesn’t think twice about it, taking the chance to stumble onto his feet and tumble his way into the building.

It’s dark.

The darkest of dark. A dark that appears to vibrate, whistle, shuddering to the wave of words. He can feel the colour rush out of his features, but his limbs feel numb as he steps forward.

He can make out the outline of spells written on the ground, a path of magic to the altar. He knows these words. They are words to defend the God. There’s no reason to be scared. The coven has no power of their own. All the magic, the glamour, the charms and curses are only possible because of the God, the Horned God of the coven.

There must be a crack in his heart, because there are tears falling from his eyes, turning a sinister red from the cuts on his face as they glide down the sides of his face, to his neck, to the darkness. He doesn’t know why he weeps as he walks down the passage, all the way to the bronze statue of a deer.

The unnatural radiance of the statue hurts his eyes, but he can not look away from those eyes.

“ ~~Chittaphon~~ ,” He murmurs, the shape of the word sitting like lead in his mouth.

His breath comes out in circles in mist as he listens to the sound of the clattering bones under him. He knows this feeling. The feeling of a grand pyramid in his vision, a swell of a marketplace, a ravishing crowd of illustrious fabrics in many colours spinning around the growing fire. The sound of a lute behind the wind. There is a pounding on the wood of the floorboards, something large and powerful coming to the world of the living.

His blood splashes onto the floor.

“They’re not here.”

He knows that voice.

“Youngho.” He turns around, wishing away his tears in front of that person.

His brother has not changed. The button-up inside of his pants, the brown hair slicked back, revealing his impeccable features, the powerful voice that echoes throughout the halls of the building, carrying the weight of enchantment in his words.

“They are dealing with the fact that there is an accumulation of gods that have arrived in town.” Youngho states, crossing his arms. He can make out the writing on his brother’s tongue, a rune of protection. “What did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything.” He replies, cowering away from his brother, out of habit more than anything.

“Donghyuck.” Youngho steps forward, and he smiles, but it reminds him of spirits.

He closes his eyes, his heart clattering in his chest at the sound of his name. His real name. The name that was given by his mother, his father, his family, his coven, before he was disowned. It’s been a long time since anyone called him by that name, and there are tremors running down his body from the reverberations of his voice.

“Don’t close your eyes. Just tell me, what you did.”

He shakes his head, holding his breath.

“Donghyuck. Don’t make me do this.”

There is the sound of runes, the wooden tones of an ancient language that was never supposed to be spoken by mortals. He opens his eyes to the sight of letters that flicker in front of his eyes, before they stab into his mouth, ramming down his throat, making him bend over and cough to the uncomfortable sensation of magic in his body.

He can’t do anything when his mouth opens, and his words start falling.

“I dug up a grave and the corpse inside came to life.” The voice that comes out of his mouth isn’t his, but it holds his truth. “I think that somethings wrong in town because of that.”

He falls to the ground when the spell leaves his throat, coughing and hacking out a combination of blood and saliva onto the hallowed grounds of the coven, the rotten remnants of an enchantment. He can catch his breath, but his heart won’t stop pounding in his ears, screaming to him in the voices of spirits.

“Shit.” Youngho curses, his black brogues pacing in front of him. “You of all people should know better than to mess with the dead. Have you learned nothing after being exiled from the coven?”

“I didn’t know.” He’s making excuses, mouth floundering with the blood that drips down his face.

His brother bends down, lifting up his chin to look at him.

“You’re obsessed with that ghoul.” He observes.

“I’m not.” He’s not a ghoul, he wants to add.

“You can’t see anything, can you?” Youngho’s voice softens, and he’s reminded of the brother that he used to know. The dependable older brother that taught him how to spindle runes and draw spells from the world. “My poor little brother, you can’t see anything with his dead body in your mind.”

He wants to protest, but he can’t see anything with the red clouding his vision. He can hear footsteps, something different from black brogues, and the hum of chatter, in the language of the coven. No, not the language of the coven, it’s a ringing sound that reminds him of birds.

“Let him go, and you can come back, Donghyuck. Remember that.”

Then there are hands on his neck, and he’s pushed into the cold depths of a watery grave.

He’s plunged into cool waters. The dark, frigid water rushes over his head, pulling him into the murky depths. He struggles to paddle to the surface, desperately gasping for air, while his throat aches with each shallow inhale of water. He strains his arms, trying to pull himself up. He can barely keep his eyes open to the onslaught of waves that crash above him.

It’s dark in the water, a blue so deep and terrifying, without another creature in sight. There is only silence as he sinks the bottom of the sea. The peace is overwhelming, and he lets the currents take him.

The surface cracks open, and he’s under the sky once more. The meadows are soft, dewy on his damp skin, and he allows the tall grass to settle over him. He blinks, and the blue of the sky is replaced by a sheer crimson. For a moment, he’s shaken, but then he remembers. He lets in a shaking breath.

“Are you okay?” Minhyung whispers, stars dripping from his eyes.

Minhyung cradles his face, water hanging from his short eyelashes. There are drops streaming down from the goblin’s face, but he can’t tell if they are tears or the summer rain that falls around them.

He chokes on the water drenching his words, heaving forward as he coughs out the seas that have formed in his lung. He keeps coughing for what feels like an eternity, his chest weak and his limbs trembling. He’s never been able to swim. Everyone knows that witches don’t learn how to swim.

“I almost died.” He wonders, staring at his drenched reflection in the opulent shade of a goblin’s eyes.

“What happened to you?” Minhyung brushes away the dampness on his face, his hands staining with the colour of mortal blood. The red in reflected in his black eyes, the sun in the essence of the cosmos, but it only takes a clack of the beads and the pain, the red, is gone. “Did someone hurt you?”

He wonders what it would take to curse the world.

“Your brother?” He whispers, a secret.

He grimaces, scrunching his brows.

He does not expect the goblin to gather him in his arms, pulling him into a warm embrace. He stares at a thousand yellow eyes in the shadows between the trees that surround them. The presence of the spirits make his features flush, a sunset drawn on the ends of his ears. There’s a clutter of emotions in his heart, blocking his airway, and lighting his stomach.

“Jisung,” Minhyung whispers, “Chenle. Come over here.”

A thousand yellow eyes drop onto the ground, rolling to his feet. Behind the blinking spectacle, a goblin tumbles out of the dark. Another goblin behind him clamours forward, in the form a demon with a cat’s tail.

Minhyung releases him from the embrace, leaving him to stare at the collection of eyes that stare back at him.

“What happened to the demigods?” He turns to the spirits.

The goblin shrugs, “They started to fight. So, we gave them a room.”

“And then we locked it.” Chenle continues, bones cracking as he morphs into a boy. The transformation from a demon to something like a human is slow and arduous, and he can only watch in horror as his limbs grow from the strangest parts of the husk of a demon.

“And the key?” Minhyung brings a hand over his eyes.

“Uh, somewhere in my stomach.” Jisung answers.

Minhyung is quiet, before he brings his hand down.

“That’s fine.” He spares a glance in his direction, bringing a finger to his lips. “We can keep them there for now. We wouldn’t want them to meet any of the old gods in town.”

The goblin are watching him, a mischievous glint in their eyes. Minhyung catches their rascally nature and waves the spirits away. In a breath, they are in the forms of wooden dolls, rolling back into the dark.

“I’ll walk you home.” Minhyung says, extending his hand. “If that’s okay.”

He nods, wondering what it is in his head that is trying to come out. The strange amalgamation of a memory, of a dream, of a crack in his heart that reminds him of a boy. He reaches for his hand, and the spirit pulls him up. The warmth of his hands are familiar. If he didn’t know any better, he would think he is holding hands with another human.

While they walk out of a nowhere decorated by the trees planted by spirits, he watches the beads that dance in his hair. The colours of the world reflected in the shades of blue and green, all the more beautiful under the crimson sky. He’s heard that the beads are the memories of the predecessors, the reveries of preceding kings, passed down to the heir to the throne. If he’s quiet, he can almost hear the sound of the orchestra, the whispers of kings.

He listens to their whispers, their curses, and let’s go of his hand.

“What’s wrong?” Minhyung asks, his movement pausing.

“We shouldn’t be together.” He answers, lamely.

The coven had many rules. A chronicle of commandments that would determine his future. He remembers writing the rules on the palm of his hands, trying to commit to a memory of what he could and what he could not do. He remembers one of the rules because of what had happened to his mother. A rule about a relationship with spirit – or, more specifically, the rule that a human could never fall in love with a goblin.

He never did have the best memory.

Minhyung presses his lips onto his forehead, a warm sensation surrounding his frame. The wind is alive around them, brushing against the back of his neck, like the touch of spirit, a moment that reminds him of death.

“I want to be.” Minhyung smiles, a play on familiar features.

There is a distraction in those black eyes, that reminds him of a childhood in his daydreams.

“You haven’t changed.” He laughs, but it feels too large for his mouth.

“Do you remember?” Minhyung hushes, a sense of gravity around him that pulls the world down to his feet, as he stares at him in such earnest. “When we would all climb the trees together, reaching the highest point, and then jump down, catching each other with only our words?”

“Of course.”

He feels lightheaded, bringing his eyes away to his dilatated apartment.

“I’ll always love you.”

If only he could say it back.

He opens the crooked mailbox, pulling out the newspaper.

The mailbox is painted a dreadful yellow that peels back when the weather is humid, revealing the scratches of light brown wood that bends a little too much to the right side. It’s not really his mailbox, but there isn’t anybody in the apartment that reads the newspaper. He doesn’t read it either, but he knows a spirit with a perchance for gathering newspapers.

He bounces the bound of news in his hands, catching the headlines about diseases and natural disasters, an impending apocalypse that might be setting on the world. Nothing new.

“Haechan.” The landlady is leaning on the entrance of the stationary store, the creases of her mouth turned downwards.

“Yes?” He replies, coming over to her side. Behind her, the store is empty. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen anyone come to the store to buy anything. But, he supposes, for there to be customers, there have to be people.

“While I was baking with the windows open, I noticed that there is a terrible smell coming from the back.” She waves her hands, the red above them echoed in the white of her eyes. “Would you be a dear and go check it out?”

“Of course.”

“Thank you, Haechan.” She doesn’t look at him, but he feels like someone is.

He walks over to the back of the apartment, usually inhabited by a culture of weeds and wildflowers, sprouting from the corners of the world of humans. He scrunches his nose when the scent of something sickeningly sweet breezes over him, wondering what the she was baking.

There’s a pounding in his head, from the headache that had him awake all night. There is knocking in his ears, a strange tune that doesn’t match the erratic beat of his heart. He rubs his forehead and doesn’t notice that there is something under his feet until the putrid scent of rotting flesh reaches his nose.

He looks down, taking in a stain of black that surrounds his shoes.

Holding his breath, he lifts the bottom of his show, taking in the crushed remnants of what used to be an eye, a gelatinous texture that has the iris stuck to the lines of his converse. His stomach scrambles up his throat and he falls backwards, scratching his arms against the gravel to get away as far as possible from the remains.

He swallows back the urge to retch, but his mouth feels so hollow. There is a flood in his body that wants to get out, and it doesn’t help that his head pulses to the chapters of commandments. His eyes water as he struggles to breath. From the tides of his vision, he can make out a trail of a black, viscous liquid that runs from his feet all the way to a rotting corpse. The black bloods of the coven.

He turns away, screaming.

He keeps screaming, screaming, screaming.

At some point, there is no sound in his screams, only a silent cry for help.

He only stops when someone jams their foot into his side.

He heaves out a gasp, unconsciously clutching his stomach. When he cracks his eyes open, he can make out the spirit that stands in front of him, the crimson shade of the sky behind him giving him an ominous atmosphere.

Jaemin bends down in front of him, turning his head as he looks at him.

“Jaemin,” He mutters.

“I’m dead.” Jaemin states, black eyes almost curious. “Why did you kill me?

“I-I didn’t mean to do it,” He stumbles, looking at the black stains on his hands. “I would never hurt you.”

“Why didn’t you kill him too?”

He blinks, the pounding in his head quieting.

“Do you remember something?” He asks, staring at the spirit.

Jaemin opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. There’s a rush of sound that surrounds him, and he can’t hear anything except for the story of another language, smooth and rounded. The wind doesn’t move, but he does. He backs away, his frame trembling to the sounds around him. He knows these sounds, the swelling of an organ, the deep tones of a music that should not be on the mortal plane.

“Jaemin, run.” He whispers, and Jaemin flickers away.

He doesn’t need to see them to know it’s here.

“What are you?” He asks, voice trembling in tandem with the tremors in his body. He tries again, “Who are you?”

The corpse stands before him, smiling.

They are beautiful. They are supernatural. There is not an imperfection in their skin, in their eyes, in their smile, but that is the only evidence he needs to prove that this thing is not human. Not even close. Most humans can’t take away the stars in the sky and leave a red horizon. Most gods can’t do that either.

“Oh.”

It dawns on him then. The reason that these strange things are happening. Or, at least, stranger things.

When he was younger, the first thing he learned about gods is that there is no such thing as new gods. The second thing he learned is that all gods have a name. The name of a god will bind them to the plane of mortals, giving them a soul, a purpose, and more importantly, an eternal supply of power.

This creature is an anomaly in the delicate balance of natural order.

“Oh no.”

At least, he thinks so.

“Do you,” He sounds, slowly enunciating his words. “Understand me?”

The corpse, or whatever it is, nods.

“Can you turn the sky back to normal?”

There’s a splash of water on his neck. He looks up to the formation of swirling clouds, rumbling in the shades of blue and gray, flashing with the hints of gold and silver patterns that swim across the currents. He’s never been more relieved to be under the sweet taste of rain.

Maybe there is a way to make his dreams come true. There is hope blooming in his chest.

He looks over at the corpse, huddled over the rotting body, their hands covered in black blood as they bring a spiral of intestines to their mouth.

With the rain on his head, he retches out the contents of his lunch onto the ground.

“He’s starting to remember.”

Chaewon’s face falls.

“No, I mean it, this time.” He continues, the volume of his voice increasing with his desperation. “He’s starting to remember what happened. The other day he practically mentioned Minhyung in conversation. It’s only a matter of time before he remembers everything. Before he remembers us.”

There’s a horde of bulgaes outside of the apartment. He can’t tell what colour their fur is supposed to be, because every time they bite into the flesh of roaming gods, there is a dark flash that hangs over the atmosphere, the intimation of an eclipse. the town must be consumed with the trenches of gods and creations, taking pleasure in breaking stars and ripping hearts. There’s a blink of darkness, and he makes sure that the doors are locked for the seventh time, wondering if the landlady will let him borrow some silver.

“Donghyuck. Stop.” Chaewon says, and it sounds like magic, the curve of her words carrying the appearance of charms. He knows it’s not a charm, not a curse, and nothing magic, but he also knows that she is the only thing in his life that is magical. “He’s dead. He’s a ghost, just like all the other ones in town.”

“No, he’s not a ghost.”

“Yes, he is. We watched him die.” When he looks at Chaewon, there are dark circles under her eyes that trickle through the painted foundation of her face. Under the dimming darkness of the room, he’s scared that if he closes his eyes, she will disappear. “Don’t you remember?”

He hates the continuous thunder of screams outside his windows, shaking the foundation of the apartment. There are shades of crimson colours flashing through his closed curtains, almost resembling the drumming in his chest, driving pain upwards. He hates that his eyes water, but he can’t remember. Or rather, he doesn’t want to remember.

“I have an idea,” He echoes, a memory. “To bring him back.”

“Donghyuck.”

“I have to. It’s my fault he died.”

“No, Donghyuck. It’s not your fault.” She must have swallowed a flight of birds, from the rattle of her frame, her hands shaking as she runs them through her black hair. “And he would never blame you for what happened.”

“What am I supposed to do?” He wonders, more to himself than anything else.

“You do what all humans do. We mourn. Without bringing the dead back.” She doesn’t look at him, but he knows she’s thinking about the same thing as him.

Because he remembers the other rule in the coven. The one he broke. The one that states that you can never, ever bring someone back to life.

_He sneezes._

_There is rain pounding down his back, the looming clouds building a maelstrom over their heads. The water is freezing but his hands are burning, as he tries to run the match over the box._

_“Shit,” Chaewon curses, trying again._

_He should have worn something more suited for a rainstorm, but according to the forecast of their destination in the middle of nowhere, it was supposed to be blue skies. But the moment they had finished drawing a circle of black chalk over the dead grass, clustered around a collection of splintered headstones, the sky had erupted into a vehement rainstorm._

_“Here, let me try.” Donghyuck offers, shaking the water from his hands._

_He reaches for the matches across him, frame tucked in neatly into the circle. The ritual won’t work if they are not both within the perimeters of protection. Donghyuck shivers, hunching over in concentration as he fiddles with the matchstick. In the distance, there is the rolling echoes of thunder, but he can’t make out the lightning through the thick plumes of gray._

_His vision blurs to the onslaught of rain as he watches the incombustible match, Chaewon in the background with her black hair matted against her forehead. She looks like she is being held underwater._

_They have only begun the ritual that they found in an abandoned apothecary, but there is already something palpably wrong about the environment. Something supernatural._

_Chaewon crosses her fingers in her lap._

_There’s a crackle and the match lights._

_The white flame stands tall, untouched by whatever falls from the sky. The white is reflected in the blackest parts of Haechan’s dark, dark eyes, resembling a meteor shower on standstill, as the two of them share a childish smile._

_“Now what?” Chaewon asks, leaning forward as if she’s telling a secret._

_“Let it fall.” Donghyuck answers, exhilaration flooding into his system. He brushes the water in his eyes against his forearms, dragging the mud that crawled up his arms all over his face._

_His hands cradle the match above the space that has formed between their knees. The descants of the earth and the skies washing over their bodies like an unholy baptism. Their breaths catch in sync as they fix their eyes on the unwavering white fire, under the influence of potential._

_The match falls onto the dead grass._

_There is the distinctive scent of smoke. Then, the appearance of thick, black lines, that crawl out of the earth and form interlaying crosses within the circle of chalk. But the lines don’t stop there, they carry on past the circle, past the meadow and over the headstones, colouring the dead grass an acrid black that seeps into their notion of reality._

_Beyond the circle, the black lines move, resembling a tree in motion, forming a scrawling of symbols that loops around and around. The symbols resemble letters. They don’t move, can’t move, frozen in their places, even when beyond the black the ground has opened to the depths of the world. Until it’s not._

_Donghyuck blinks to a blurringly blue sky. There is not a cloud in sight. There’s a bundle of nerves in his stomach that won’t settle down as he stares at the dead grass. The black circle has disappeared._

_“Fuck,” Donghyuck mutters, biting his lips. “What the fuck.”_

_His heart is beating to an unnatural rhythm, legs thrumming with the urge to run away. But his bones are aching, and he can only tremor in the protection of the circle._

_“Is this supposed to happen?” Chaewon’s voice trembles._

_He doesn’t get a chance to answer because the grass rustles._

_Chaewon whimpers, grabbing his hand. He can’t tell whose hands are shaking._

_Something’s here. On these hallowed grounds, there is something wandering. He doesn’t dare look up from his muddied hands, dirt caked into his short fingernails. He wonders if it’s terror that makes his limbs feel cold under the shower of sunlight overarching his trembling frame._

_There are white converse that step into their vision. They look up._

_“Jaemin.”_

_Donghyuck breaks into a smile, crawling forward to the familiar figure. He doesn’t look a day over dead, with his clean, white sweater, blue jeans, and bright eyes._

_“You’re alive.” He exclaims, a sense of exhilaration clouding his mind._

_He doesn’t notice the way that Chaewon backs away, her eyes shaking. She grabs his arm, but he doesn’t feel anything._

_“Who are you?” Jaemin asks, his unnaturally black, black eyes looking down on them._

_That’s when he begins to think that he made a terrible mistake._

The sky is blue.

Or, at least, he thinks it is, based on the small opening in his closed curtains.

“Your brother is here.” Chaewon says, her head hidden by the brown door of the fridge.

He rolls away from the blue, throwing the knitted covers of his bed onto the floor as he tumbles to his feet. The wash of his morning without the whispers of spirits douses his head in a feeling of spring, a reminder of dreams.

He doesn’t think when he opens the door, looking up at his brother with closed eyes. Youngho stands before him, his head brushing against the top of the door frame. He’s dressed in an impeccable black suit, his brown hair pushed back to show his dark and handsome features. But his eyes are what stand out. There is no white in his eyes, only a wash of black. They look like the eyes of cattle.

Before he can say anything, his throat is locked, and he is lifted from the ground.

Youngho – no, the God walks into the apartment, the floor creaking under black brogues.

He can’t breathe, looking into the eyes of the God. He knows these eyes. From the moment he could dream, those eyes haunted his awakening nightmares. There are a flood of nerves caught in the web of his throat, but he can’t swallow them back because there is the burning sensation of a million hands wringing his neck.

“Where is that thing,” The God screams, but the mouth does not move. He hears the voice in his head, and it causes a violent cascade of trembling in his body, quaking to the absolute power that is contained in the words of a God, the words that humans are not supposed to hear. “Where is the wretched thing that is feasting on my followers?”

He watches Chaewon run forward, the shade of silver in her hands, but the God only snaps their fingers and she is flung across the room, her head hitting the edge of the wooden bed with a resounding sound that reverberates in the recesses of his stomach, making the extremities of his body feel impossibly cold.

They say everything in your life flashes before your eyes when you die.

But he can’t see anything.

“Where is it?” The God commands.

And his mouth is opened, the edges of his mouth being torn apart to make room for the outpouring of words that crawl up his throat, the letters covered in blood falling out of his mouth.

“I don’t know.”

He can barely open his eyes, not when there is a flood in his eyes and an incessant thrumming in his mouth. Not when there is a massive cathedral that hangs over him, the stained windows of glass echoing the verses of reverence, the coven on their knees, black blood falling from the place where their eyes should be, castrated before the one and only God. The faces of the coven plague his mind, from the curve of their frowns, the crease of their brows, the curses in their breathe.

“You were always more trouble that you were worth.” The disturbance of his brother’s familiar voice has him shaking back into a stream of consciousness. The expression of his brother, the furrow of his eyebrows and the slight downturn of his mouth has him holding his breath. “I should have killed you when I had the chance.”

He can hear his heart breaking.

There is pain, immensely so, as he is thrown down, crumpling on the ground. There is the numbing sensation of pain that drains from his head, to his arms, to his stomach, to his legs, everywhere he can feel, as if there were another body inside of him that is coming out, pushing his blood and tearing through his skin.

Youngho, or whatever it is, looks down at him with blackened eyes.

He wonders what colour the sky is, when there is a hand above his face.

There is a pale hand suspended over his head, connected to an arm that goes through Youngho’s chest.

The blackened eyes are wide as he falls onto his knees, giving him a look into a cracking soul. There must be a cascade of seismic activity across the geography of his face, tightening his forehead and loosening his jaw. He mouths something, but he can’t hear anything because there is a rain of black blood that splashes over him, pooling around his head.

He didn’t know gods could die.

The arm slides out, and the God falls over, body limp and head rolling to the side.

Behind them, is the corpse. And they are beautiful. The terrifying and haunting kind of beauty that you can’t take your eyes away from, even as a tragedy unfolds before you.

The corpse is licking their fingers, covered in the black bloods of the coven. With a blank expression, they bend down and thrust their hands into the lifeless body of his brother, pulling out the flesh of organs, the strings of arteries, and shoving it into their mouth. He feels numb as he listens to the sound of his brother’s flesh being consumed, the gnashing of teeth, the scraping of bones, the wet splashes of the insides of a witch.

He only reacts when the corpse comes closer to him, bringing a hand drenched in black blood to his face.

He squeezes his eyes shut, reading death in his future.

But there are no hands that tear through his stomach or serrated teeth that bite into his neck, instead, the pain in his body subsides. He opens his eyes again, and the corpse smiles at him.

“Are you okay?” The corpse asks, the procession of a thousand spirits and gods in their eyes.

He sits up, a chill running down his body.

He turns his head, without taking his eyes away from the corpse, to check on Chaewon’s unconscious body. He can’t hear any breathing, but he also can’t hear the whisper of a spirit.

The corpse follows his eyes, and smiles.

Chaewon rises, sucking in a ragged breath.

“Chaewon,” He whimpers, stumbling over to her side. He doesn’t know what to ask, looking at her widened eyes, the frazzle of her black hair around her bearing resemblance with an angel’s halo. “Are you – do you, know who I am?”

“Donghyuck.” She answers, and he feels so incredibly relieved. “You’re my best friend, Lee Donghyuck.” 

He wraps his arms around her, and somehow there are tears that fall from his eyes.

“I’m sorry,” He cries into her shoulder, “You almost died because of me.”

“No, Donghyuck,” She murmurs, a soft whisper in his ears, “Not everything’s about you. If anything, I almost died because of me. Because I love you, and I’ll always die for you.”

He wonders where he heard those words.

“You know,” Chaewon stares at him, forming her words with care. “Jaemin felt the same way.”

He doesn’t get a chance to let the words sink in, because her eyes are caught on something behind him.

“Are you okay?” The corpse asks from behind him, a rush of sound.

Chaewon stares at the corpse and the dead remains of a witch behind them, narrowing her eyes in concentration. She’s always been the smart one, and when they were a part of the coven, she had a way with the supernatural, an attunement to all creatures of the night. Of course, they are not in the coven anymore, but she’s still smarter than him.

“What the fuck is that?” She curses, turning the accusation to him.

“That’s the thing I dug up.” He answers, an idea forming in his head.

He beckons the corpse – the creature, or something, over with his hands. It is only when he can make out the brown shade of their eyes, so unlike the creatures that he is familiar with, that he says, “Can you make me a promise?”

The corpse smiles, a perfect smile that shows perfect dimples.

“I will make you a God,” He whispers, and only when there are no creatures that break into his apartment, the scriptures of ancient gods inscribed on every inch of pale skin, preaching in the wallows of prophecy, he continues, “In exchange, I want you to bring someone back from the dead.”

“Okay.” The corpse nods.

“Give me the knife,” He says, turning to Chaewon.

“Are you sure about this?” She frowns, holding the small, silver knife behind her back. She wears a stern expression, but there is a tremor in mouth and a fluttering in her eyes. “We don’t know what will happen.”

“I’m okay with that.” He looks out of the door, and the sky is blue.

Chaewon leans forward, holding her breath. “Then so am I. Give me your hand.”

The stench of death surrounds them. There is the scent of rosemary and ginger, the remnants of copper, that wafts from black bloods, reminding him of what could have been. She stares at the blade, a cross etched into the wooden handle, before Chaewon traces the knife against the palm of his hand, and where the silver meets skin there is the bloom of a thousand crimson flowers, drops of blood splattering onto his bed.

The corpse watches them, something in their eyes.

“I’ll give you a name.”

Chaewon lays down the knife and he bathes his finger in blood, painting across the corpse’s forehead. He writes a J, an A, an E, forming the letters into something like an incantation without magic, all while staring into brown eyes, remembering the boy from his childhood with brown eyes.

“You can’t name him Jaemin,” Chaewon hisses from his side.

He pauses, taking the blood into a different direction.

“This is your name, okay?” He wonders if his voice reveals his desperation. “And I am your follower.”

When his raises his fingers, the naming is concluded.

“Who are you?” He asks, holding his breath.

The world is silent around them. There is a parade of flies that are flying around them room, lured by the poisonous remains of a witch, but he can’t hear them. He can’t hear anything. He can’t hear the spirits in his head, the wind in his ears, the screams, the cries, the protests of the coven, and the pounding in his head.

“I’m Jaehyun.”

They bring a hand to their forehead, staring in wonder at the shade of red that stains their fingers. There’s a star that breaks across neat features, shattering into a storm of daylight that brightens the dark shade of brown eyes and the mellow draw of eyebrows. The scene is cut from a movie, with wide windows letting the sun wash over a broad frame.

Except, there are no stars in the sky and he never drew the curtains of his window.

He reaches for Chaewon’s hand, staring at the new God that they brought into the world.

There are warm, brown eyes in front of him.

Donghyuck smiles.

And this time, Jaemin smiles back.

**Author's Note:**

> This story was inspired by the wonderful 'Blessed and Cursed' @tyoungi. The dark and chilling vibes of that story really inspired me to try out the genre of horror, kind of. This story isn't really scary, but I like the implications.


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